Kantai Collection: The Strong in Heart
by The Budgie Admiral
Summary: A century after her steel hull's cancellation, Japanese battleship Kii is summoned into existence to defend her country from the Abyssal onslaught. The fate of her dear sister however is unknown, and Kii begins to wonder why Owari refuses to follow the call to arms. (Disclaimer: I do not own Kantai Collection. Duh.)
1. Chapter Zero: The Story of a Lifetime

**Hello dear reader.**

Thank you sincerely for reading my story, The Strong in Heart.

Before you continue, please be informed that I am unable to provide a regular update schedule due to the structure of my life and therefor updates may come infrequent.

Be also informed that English is not my first language and, while I am still confident I can deliver decent English writing, I may make the occasional mistake. I welcome advice and corrections as I hope to improve my writing as I go. Additionally, the fact that my browser insists on autocorrecting everything to my mother tongue is quite the annoyance.

This story was influenced by two notable works of KC fiction: "Things no longer allowed involving shipgirls" and "Belated Battleships". I have actively been writing for the former and the advice of the people on their Discord server has been crucial in getting this project started in the first place. I would like to express my gratitude towards all the good-hearted folks that have helped my nascent writing improve!

If you want to discuss this story or ask me a question regarding it, I would like to direct you towards the official Spacebattles thread (link is in my bio). I am very active on that site, more so than here, and will gladly chat with you, the readers, about the story and its characters.

Thank you again for dropping by, and please, be my guest and start reading down below.

* * *

In light of the recent passing of Articles 11 and 13 in the EU (which is where I reside), I see it as necessary to add a disclaimer to this story:

I do not own Kantai Collection, nor am I affiliated with the creatorsof Kantai Collection. I do not make any money from this story.

* * *

**Chapter Zero: The Story of a Lifetime**

"This way, ma'am." Jane Thompson was struggling to keep up as the lab-coated man led her through the veritable maze of hallways, stairwells and reception areas that constituted the Yokosuka Veteran's Hospital. Rooms flew by in haste, sealed behind blank wooden doors. All doors were the same, boring, repetitive, the only difference was the number on the small stainless steel sign on each door.

Jane mused that it was befitting of the industry. An overtaxed mental care system for which each patient was nothing but another case, another folder, another burden. Marcus would have loved to write a harsh-worded article about that. His mother was a shipgirl, after all, she had fought in the war, and she had suffered in it.

Up another flight of stairs they went in the building. Their steps echoed through the otherwise abandoned halls. A key entered a keylock and the loud clack of a heavy fireproof lock sounded through the hallway like a gunshot, amplified by the tall stairwell.

On the other side of the heavy door, the hallways were different. The floor was no longer linoleum but carpet, and the walls too were carpet, only the ceiling wasn't. Warm light oozed from the lamps on the walls, no longer the cold neon tubes Jane had noticed downstairs. Jane stopped for a moment and reached out to touch the wall. It was smooth, and it gave way to the touch. She pressed harder and found herself wondering how far the cushioning would go. Who it was made for was obvious at least.

"Here she is, ma'am." The man says, standing in front of a white door at the far end of the hallway. She heads towards it, hesitant now. "Mind you, the woman is very old. If she says she wants to have a break, you take a break."

Jane nods. "Yes, of course."

Without further comment, the man knocks on the door and slowly opens it.

* * *

The room Jane now enters is small. A window looks out over the surrounding town, but it's small and there is the unmistakable cris-cross pattern of safety glass. It also doesn't open. On one side of the room, far furthest from the window, where the light is scarce, is a desk with old paper blueprints strewn about. An archaic TV screen also resides there, bolted onto the wall. Drawers line another side of the room, all with locks on them. Underneath the window is an armchair, and in the armchair sits an elderly woman.

Her frame is small, tiny in fact, Jane's daughter must be taller by now than she is. Her face is wrinkled, her eyes are distant, her ponytail is bright gray. As Jane takes another step into the room, she looks up and tries to smile.

"Ah, welcome." She says, and beckons Jane to sit. "You are the reporter, yes?"

"Yes, uh, I am." Jane says and moves to sit on the chair at the desk.

"The reporter she is, yes." Says the old woman, and her eyes turn distant again for a second before they shoot up to the side, focusing an nothing. "You hear that, Owari? We will be in the newspaper, yes. Hmm."

Jane does not talk. The lady doesn't either, she seems to be busy fidgeting with her hands. Hands that, Jane notices, are barely more than a skeleton covered with loose sheets of skin.

"Where are my manners, young one?!" the lady suddenly says, and stands up to walk over to a sideboard, where a thermos is located. Her hands unscrew the lid slowly, and warm, well-smelling tea is poured into a cup. Her skeletal fingers grasp the cup and, shaking, she brings it over and offers it to Jane on two hands, like a blossoming flower.

Jane accepts and thanks the old woman, her hands carefully grasp the porcelain cup and she blows over it to cool it. The smell of green tea wavers through the room.

"Owari and I, we grew these leaves." The lady says as she sits down in her chair with visible effort. "Back in the day when our thoughts and our bodies were still free, yes…" she sighs and shoots a furious glance at the lab coat man.

Jane is unsure how to respond, and so she hesitantly takes a small sip of the cup. The tea tastes delicious indeed, a strong, herbal taste that reminds Jane of the smell of a large stretch of woodland.

"Nature's essence, isn't it?" the woman says, and tries to laugh. "Owari always says that I am obsessed with nature…" A second of silence, then suddenly the old woman looks up again and shouts "Yes you do!"

Jane clears her throat. "Ma'am, I am here because I am writing a book documenting the history of the kanmusu program. I…" Jane opens her purse and produces a small booklet and a pen. "I wanted to ask you a few questions, as one of the few remaining kanmusu, I was hoping you could help me fill in some gaps in my timeline? Many things are still classified, so it's hard to get an accurate picture of what happened."

The woman looks up at these words. "I won't give you classified information!" she declares. "However, I'll help you as best as I can, yes. Yes."

Jane takes another sip of the tea. It's cooler now, and drinking it is easier and the taste is even richer. Then, she puts the cup down on the des besides her and readies her pen. "So, maybe we could start with how you were summoned?"

The lady's eyes grow distant again, she sighs. "I am the only kanmusu still around, you know?" she suddenly says. "All the others, scrapped. They chose to live like normal humans. Heh, what an illusion. No one ever forgets their faces. I didn't. I still have my guns, my armor, my speed… The eternal guardian of Japan I was, and I still am, and I will be until all my powers are consumed and all my will is broken! Hah!" she half-shouts, half-laughs at the man in the labcoat, a spark of defiance in her eyes. She stands quicker than Jane, and with a whirl of her kimono, a katana manifests in her hand, and five steel turrets take aim at Jane and the guard.

The color fades from the humans' faces at the sight. The lady may be old, mad and close to death, but her will is unbroken, and her defiance against the inevitable is scary and admirable at the same time.

Down the hallway, the door falls closed and the locks snap shut. The lady hears this and sheathes her katana. Her rigging disappears, and she sits back down in the armchair. The defiance is gone from her eyes, and any onlooker might be under the impression that the outburst never happened. Jane however will never see the woman with the same eyes again.

"Yes, yes. My summoning." She says with a tired, thoughtful voice. "So long ago." She hesitates a while, ten seconds at least, with closed eyes and a tensed body. When she opens them, the spark of defiance is back in her eyes.

"Fine." She says and a cheeky smile passes over her face for the blink of an eye. "I don't have long to live anymore, so I better start talking. I hope you have time at your hands, reporter, because I, Kii, will tell you the story of a lifetime."


	2. Chapter one: Birth

**Chapter One: Birth**

The first seconds of her life felt like a magazine explosion.

Emerging from… Wherever she had been before, Kii could feel a force, tearing her out of her peaceful slumber and forcing her into a body, a personality, a mind. Suddenly, what was undefined was forced into definition, uncertainty became certainty as ideas took physical form.

It was actually very painful.

When she was manifested, her body slumped to the ground as Kii's nascent mind frantically tried to make sense of the situation. First, there was a horrible headache she noticed, and a churning, violent, nauseous feeling in her stomach. Convulsions shook her, and a gush of foul-stinking vomit erupted from her mouth. Coughing and spitting, Kii slowly raised her eyes.

The light was blinding at first, but with each second it got better. She could see shapes moving, two shapes were definitely heading towards her. For a millisecond she had the overwhelming urge to evade the collision, to warn the others to get out of her way.

"AAAH!" she screamed, and tried to stumble backwards, but her limbs felt numb and clumsy, and so all she did was drench her arm in her vomit. Loud sounds came as a reaction, and two strong hands lifted her off the ground, their grasp causing ripples of pain to shoot through her arms. Something stung her left arm, and the world turned black.

* * *

When Kii awoke, she still felt horribly awkward, but not as bad as before. She was still numb, but now she wasn't panicked about it. She also was no longer freezing, a warm blanket covered her body, and she was laying on a soft, cozy bed. Her arm had been cleaned, the foul stench of vomit was gone, and so was the wet feeling on her hand. It also was more silent, and Kii welcomed the silence with open arms.

Her mouth though felt dry, and she wanted to drink something, preferably soon.

Slowly, Kii, opened her eyes to find that the world was still a bit blurry and bright, but it was getting a bit better every second, just like before. She tried moving an arm, it worked, but she still wasn't positive about her fingers, those were still numb and unresponsive.

Therefor, she opened her mouth and tried to speak. "chrgh…" she vocalized.

"Ah, great, you're awake!" a voice said. Kii blinked and only now noticed that the shape at her feet actually was a person. "Welcome to Fleet Activities Yokosuka!"

Kii was honestly not very impressed, she was in Yokosuka, cool, but her mouth still was painfully devoid of liquid, she needed that first, then she could marvel at everything. Focusing, she tried to speak again.

"Water…" she croaked, but it seemed that the person had understood what she wanted. She looked worried.

"Oh! Gomenasai! I'll fetch you some, don't move!" she said, got up from the bed and hasted out of sight.

Not a minute later, and the girl was back. A girl she was, Kii could see that now, with colourful hair and joyful eyes, slender and a quick runner. Her hands clutched a white plastic cup.

"Here, drink this!" the girl said and walked up to Kii's bed to help her drink with her clumsy hands. Eagerly, Kii swallowed the cool liquid. It wasn't the best water, and it tasted mostly of plastic cup rather than nature, but right in that moment Kii wouldn't have traded it for anything in the world.

The cup sufficiently emptied, Kii sighed in content and leaned back. The bed was cozy, and she was tired, and her eyes fell closed as a sigh of relaxation escaped her mouth. But where were her manners.

"Thank you, young one." Kii said, opening her eyes again and looking at the young lady. Her voice now carried a tune, a nice tune, Kii mused, although it was still weak and forming words was awkward and required her full attention. "What… what happened?" she asked the girl. "Who are you?"

"Ah, I'm Mutsuki! I offered to take care of you for the first few days of your stay here." The girl, no, Mutsuki, smiled again. Yes, she had that aura about her. She was not an ordinary human, just like Kii herself wasn't, they were different, and they were both flesh and steel in a way that broke your mind if you thought about it too long. Mutsuki spoke up again. "But before I answer your questions, what do you remember?"

Kii frowned, she didn't remember much at all. Everything was blurred shapes and blinding lights and deafening sounds. "Not much, I'm afraid…" she responded.

Mutsuki didn't look surprised or disappointed, that was good. "Yeah, thought so. Admiral said your summoning was unnaturally violent. The scientists assume it's because you were never built and only designed. So a lot of effort was required to create your form. Something something spiritual energy, something something Singer waves, blab la bla. Scientists are weird people…" She sighed.

"Anyways, once you popped up, you collapsed and started screaming and vomiting. Akashi had to put you down. By the way, you're still drugged with sedatives, so I advise against moving too much, you might pass out again. Akashi decided to keep you sedated through the coming night, and once morning hits we'll gradually get you off the drugs and get you accustomed to your body."

"Akashi." Kii frowned again. "Who is that? I haven't heard the name before."

"Ah, Akashi's our repair ship. Also de facto the medic of our shipgirl force."

Kii nodded slowly. Yes, that made sense. So, Mutsuki, a destroyer. She knew the Mutsuki class, they had been started around the same time as she was. Akashi, a repair ship. Hmm…

"How many of… our kind exist out there?" Kii was suddenly boiling with questions. "How much time has passed? What has happened since I was cancelled? I, Kii, demand to know!"

"Well…" Mutsuki sighed. "What happened? A LOT happened. Many good things, many…" Mutsuki hesitated and looked a way for a second. "Many bad things." She finished, the words heavy with the implied knowledge of unspoken horror and pain.

"Short version is, it's the year 2016. We're at war against a mystical and possibly alien bunch of creatures known as the Abyssals. Modern weapons are ineffective against them, their princesses have very advanced jamming systems, so missiles and guided weapons tend to miss. And modern warships don't have good guns or armor anymore, so they're quite outmatched."

"Through some accident, Mikasa was the first shipgirl summoned. The Abyssals were bombing Tokyo when she appeared and drove them off. A lot of research happened, and after many failed attempts a ragtag group of scientists and priests found out how to summon shipgirls. And we've been the tip of the spear against the Abyssals ever since. They're over a hundred of us now in Japan alone, and probably a thousand across the world. You're the first shipgirl we summoned that was never launched though."

Kii took all this in, marveling at the thoughts. A century in the future! A mysterious enemy threatening her beloved home! And a group of beings like her were the bulwark against them! Her fingers itched as her instincts came to life. She was a woman now, but she also was a gargantuan machine, designed to defeat the enemy and protect her people. She had been called upon to do just that. To do what the politicians had not permitted her in her past life, if you could even call it that!

Though she still had a few questions that would need to be answered first.

"Mutsuki…" The destroyer in question looked up and into her eyes, a questioning frown on her childlike features.

"Yes?"

"What are missiles?"


	3. Chapter Two: Family

**Chapter Two: Family**

"Okay, Kii! Now summon your rigging!" Mutsuki shouted from the water. Her features carried an expectant smile. That Nagato, flagship of the kanmusu fleet and member of the Big Seven was watching the exercise didn't help, Kii thought nervously.

"That… That is much easier said than done!" Kii responded. She took a careful step into the water, and, just as she expected, her foot sank deep into it without even a semblance of resistance. "How do I do this?"

"Just… Uhh, do it!" Mutsuki said and smiled. "It was hard for all of us the first time."

'Just do it.' Yes. Yes, she would like to 'just do it'. The issue was that she didn't know how. Again, Nagato's silently judging gaze did plenty to increase her nervousness. She was probably thinking what a failure of a battleship they had summoned!

Kii tried the foot again, with the same result.

"Uuh… I, Kii, am embarrassed…"

"Nah, big one." Mutsuki said, and somehow her smile became even brighter. "Just try again, you'll do it eventually. Just trust your instincts!"

Kii hesitated. Her eyes were affixed to the water of the training pool, where the waves she had caused with her boot were slowly dying off. From the water, her face stared back at her, with green eyes and her own long black hair and wearing her own green kimono.

Since her summoning two days ago, Kii had felt something was amiss, something was not quite right about her existence. Something, or someone, was missing, Kii knew it in her deepest of hearts, but until now she hadn't quite been able to place her finger on it.

Now however, the realization hit her like a truck.

"Kii, where are you going?" Mutsuki shouted. Nagato huffed dismissively as Kii walked away from the water, from the docks, slowly at first, and then bursting into a flat-out run.

She remembered now. Not in vision, no, but in feelings. Someone was missing. Someone important.

Puzzled base personnel scurried out of her way as she ran, asked her if everything was alright in passing, shot her worried glances. Kii had no time or thought to spend on them however, for she needed to see someone. She needed to talk to the Admiral.

* * *

She didn't get very far. As soon as she threw open the door to the Admiral's office, Ooyodo got out of her chair and stepped into her way.

"Sorry, Admiral's in a video conference. You can't get in."

Kii fixed the office door with her gaze, looking past the cruiser. "I just need to ask him about my sister!" she said, panting from the run.

"Your sister? Owari, right?"

The battleship froze for a second. Yes, Owari was her name. She nodded.

"We haven't tried summoning her yet, so you can't meet her."

"I need to know if Owari is alright! Please!" Kii begged. Maybe she also yelled. She wasn't sure afterwards.

Either way, the discussion was loud enough to filter through the door and catch the Admiral's attention, because Admiral Fukuda was now standing in the frame. Her uniform was without stain or wrinkle, but her eyes were tired and bloodshot.

"Admiral!" Ooyodo turned around to face her superior. "You need sleep!"

"Yeah, yeah…" she muttered in return, his voice hinting of strength but dripping with sleep deprivation.

"You really shouldn't push yourself like this, ma'am." The secretary ship said and continued to advise the Admiral on the matters of the day.

Kii stood in the room and tried to make her tall, slender frame seem as small as possible. She had not wanted to interrupt her superior in such important work, that was uncourtly. But she had a feeling that the matter was urgent, and she was impatiently fidgeting with her fingers until she couldn't wait anymore. "Admiral, we need to summon my sister Owari!"

A moment of puzzled silence as the Admiral considered how to deal with this new situation. Ooyodo shot her a scolding look but didn't raise her voice.

"Your sister?" she finally spoke after what to Kii felt like an eternity.

"Yes…" the battleship responded.

"Do you miss her?" she asked.

"Yes!" Kii said. But she did not get her point. "But that is not the issue."

Now both Ooyodo and the Admiral frowned. "Speak up, sailor." Kii just fidgeted even more furiously.

"Sir, I, Kii, feel we need to urgently summon her." Ooyodo's frown turned from curiosity to annoyance. "I can't explain it… But I feel efforts to summon her must be made as soon as possible, Admiral ma'am!"

Kii stood at attention as the woman looked at her. Again, instead of talking, she walked over to Kii and placed a hand on her shoulder. The touch reassured her, and suddenly she felt a wave of trust and affection for her superior. The Admiral cared for her and for her sister.

"Okay, we'll do it." She said and looked Kii in the eyes. "I'll have Ooyodo make the necessary arrangements. Don't worry about your sister too much, she will be with us soon."

Kii's eyes lit up with anticipation. "Yes! I, Kii, thank you sincerely, Admiral!" she said, eagerness and anticipation in her voice.

"Fine. Now, please excuse us, I need to talk with Ooyodo in private."

Kii snapped a salute and turned on her heel. She had what she longed for! Soon, she and her sister would be united again! Maybe they could even get her two other unnamed sisters! Oh, the Admiral truly was a kind leader!

* * *

As the office door closed, Ooyodo shot a sideward look at the Admiral. "Miné, are you sure this was a wise move?" Ooyodo asked the Admiral. "She's new, she's probably just confused. Is it clever to let her antics influence your command?"

"She seems a bit confused indeed." The lady responded. "She sure does… But we will need every kanmusu we can get soon. And, yes, I agree, the No 13's should have a higher priority."

She sighed. Ooyodo looked at the door where Kii had stood a moment ago.

"You see, Ooyodo, I don't believe in coincidences. If Kii is worried about her sister like this, there must be a reason. Maybe she knows something, maybe she doesn't and it's just her instincts telling her something, but it's not a risk I fancy taking."

"Risk?" Ooyodo asked and looked at her superior from the side.

"The risk of something going wrong with Owari. I mean, we've had failed summonings before, we shouldn't risk losing a powerful battleship if we can afford it."

* * *

The sea far away seemed to burn as the sun slowly disappeared underneath the horizon. The sound of the waves, the screeching of the birds, and the complete absence of anyone accompanied Kii while she stood silently, gaze affixed on the horizon. It looked like a thousand battles were raging in the distance, but of course it only was an illusion created by hundreds of kilometers of atmosphere deflecting a star's light.

Kii was alone, but she knew she would not be alone much longer. Soon, her sister would come to join her! Soon, they would be reunited to fight side by side! Standing on the beach, her mind reached out to find her sister like she had done a thousand times before her summoning. But she couldn't find her. She must be sleeping, or otherwise occupied wherever she was now.

"Sister, watch!" Kii whispered to her, and then she stood on the water a dozen meters off the shore, proudly brandishing her rigging as the sun's final rays drenched her turrets and funnels in golden light. Soon, both of them would stand united, and they would finally answer the call to defend their people, their beloved homeland in the direst of times. They would finally live the lives the politicians had robbed from them before birth, and they would live it as sisters in arms and in blood.

"I'll be expecting you, sis!" Kii spoke to the horizon. "Don't be late!"


	4. Chapter Three: Lost and found

**Chapter Three: Lost and found**

US Marine Corporal Marcus Harrington sat in the mess hall of Yokosuka, alone, for his comrades had gone off into the town center in hopes of finding some female company. Heh, something he didn't have to worry about, Marcus thought and played with the ring on his hand. It was a nice ring, simplistic and subliminal, stainless steel, not much in the way of decorations. Nonetheless, it mattered to him, not for its monetary value but for what it stood for.

"Hi!" A slightly accented female voice caught his attention. Looking up, he immediately identified the young woman standing at his table as a shipgirl. Judging from her clothing and her stature, she was a light cruiser, probably Sendai-class. She was looking at him with a cute smile on her face. "Is this seat vacant?"

"Sure!" Marcus responded, and the young lady sat down across from him. "What's your name again? I don't think we've met before…"

"Ah, Sendai." The young lady responded with a smirk. "Heard the Lake Erie is leaving tomorrow?"

"Shakedown cruise." Marcus responded. "They had to do some extensive repairs and upgrades, so we're leaving for a patrol of the coastal waters before we're back to actual escort and combat missions."

"Makes sense. Hope you stay safe."

"Eh, little Abyssal presence so close to the mainland." Marcus said and poked the food on his plate with his fork. He wasn't really hungry, but he knew he should enjoy the quality food in Yokosuka as long as he could. For all the high-tech that the Lake Erie offered, her chef wasn't exactly the best at his work, at least compared to the masters here on base.

Sendai watched this in silence, occasionally taking a sib of her coffee. Soon though, she turned her eyes to Marcus and placed her head in her hands. Together with the suggestive smile on her face, Marcus was gradually starting to feel uncomfortable, until he spoke up.

"Okay, what's up?"

"You now Providence is thirsty for you?" Sendai said.

Of course the discussion was going to turn this way. That poor love-struck cruiser just couldn't leave him be, could she?

"Yes." He sighed. She smiled even more and pursed her lipstick-clad lips.

"And you know she'd do anything for you?"

"Yes."

"And you do feel…" Sendai said, expectantly raising her eyebrows.

"Honored but not interested." Marcus responded and raised his hand to highlight the ring on his finger.

Sendai's face turned from an expectant smile into an accusing scowl. "Aww, man! She's such a nice girl, she deserves better!"

"Sure she does! But I'm still married, and I don't intend to change that!"

Sendai's head flopped down on the desk like a disappointed child. For a while, both sat in silence, Marcus taking the occasional bite off his steak, and Sendai looking over to the other tables.

Suddenly, she lifted her head and gave Marcus a knowing and also slightly suggestive smirk. "Ah, I see how it is!"

"How what is?" Marcus responded, slightly confused.

"You tease! You rascal you!" she laughed and threw him a wink.

"Wha- NO!"

"Don't deny it, we both know it's true…" she spoke, a musical undertone in her voice.

Marcus gave up, his hands met his face and an exasperated sigh escaped his throat. "Did Providence recruit you to do this?"

"No, not directly…" Sendai said and whistled innocently.

"I see. Well, I'm terribly sorry, but I'm married and have two wonderful children."

"Yeah, well, it was worth a try." Sendai said, and suddenly returned back to normal. "Just stay safe. I heard there's an Abyssal force massing for another push at Midway, they might divert the Erie there if things go south." Her voice went quiet. "If you make your wife AND Providence sad by dying uselessly in combat, I'll personally climb up to heaven to give you one hell of a spanking, she's my friend, and I want her to be happy and not grief over your corpse."

* * *

The summoning chamber was a dark, quiet concrete box located in a separate facility close to the waterfront. The only audible sounds were the waves outside and Kii's throbbing heart. She was so excited to see her sister, but after two hours of constant videos, songs, poems and whatever might give off Singer waves, her worries were beginning to grow into panic.

"Don't worry, I'm sure she'll pop up eventually." Mutsuki whispered, standing at her side. Kii looked down on the small destroyer, and she looked up at her as the band began to play another song. Minutes passed as the deafening crescendo of trumpets and horns echoed in the small chamber, but even with the music the sickening silence still hung in the room.

They were going to give up soon, Kii realized. They would give up and abandon her sister.

The song reached its end, and everyone turned a last hopeful gaze towards the summoning circle. However, the efforts were in vain. No blinding light, no scent of smoke, and no Owari appeared.

Kii felt a pair of eyes on her, and as she looked around she noticed that they belonged to Admiral Fukuda. The woman was exhausted, they all were, but more so than anything her eyes echoed a message: 'I'm sorry.'

"Allright everyone." She spoke up and turned to face the room again, decidedly not looking at Kii. "We're packing up. Tomorrow at the same time we'll be making another attempt. The lab will analyze the data we've gathered and improve the music selection."

Kii had seen this moment coming, and it still hit her like a punch in the guts. What had happened to her sister that she didn't answer the call?

"Don't worry, tall one, probably just something wrong with the ritual." Yes, Mutsuki was right. They were making a mistake. Mistakes happen all the time, everywhere, and the smallest hiccup could cause the entire summoning to fail. Someone somewhere had played the wrong note, had forgotten to add a zero behind some number, had issued the wrong requisition orders. It surely was nothing.

Kii looked down to find Mutsuki giving her a worried face. Then, the young girl with the vivid hair color took the fast battleship by the hand. The touch felt nice, and also hurt, because Kii remembered how her sister had held her hand when they had been little. It wasn't the same.

Together, they walked out of the summoning chamber amidst the stream of disappointed officers and shipgirls.

"It feels like a part of you is dying, doesn't it?" A voice suddenly spoke from behind Kii's back. Turning around, she spotted a carrier- or was it a battleship? Kii couldn't tell. "Who are you?" she asked the stranger.

"Akagi. First carrier division." She said and extended her hand. Her stoic comrade did the same and introduced herself. "Kaga." She said. That was it.

"Hey…" Akagi started, "If you need company, we're always here for you. You can come to see us any time."

"I second this." Another carrier chimed in, one with white hair and a wonderful smile on her features. "And I'm sure my sister is not to be outdone by the first division either." She said and an elbow hit the side of a green-haired shipgirl to her left.

"Yeah, just say the word and we're there."

"Dess!" a voice chimed in, and many more followed suit in expressions of affection and consolation.

Kii felt a warm tear run down her cheek, and she fell into Akagi's arms, sobbing. Mutsuki hugged both of them, or at least tried, her arms weren't quite long enough.

* * *

The pool of black goo erupted in a bright green fire. The flames shot skywards, drenching the black cave on the remotest of remote rocks in the Pacific in an eerie light. Soon, the flame subsided, leaving a thick smoke in its wake.

A shape manifested itself in the twilight. As the smoke cleared, the shape became more and more distinct, until the eyes of the onlookers were able to discern the form of a naked female human, stumbling out of the smoke and falling to the wet, muddy ground, coughing and gasping for air.

"Process complete." One of the scientists reported to the Queen. The Queen was, in reality, not an Abyssal. She was a human, but a human with such a dark and twisted soul that she might as well have been an Abyssal.

She had been a scientist once, long ago in the days before the war. She had been the first to discover the spiritual energy, but her asshole of a colleague, cursed Franz Singer, had stolen her work and published it under his name. He had gained the fame that had been rightfully hers.

From that day onward, she had sworn herself that she would never again be second best. She would show them how powerful her discovery really was, how hopelessly outmatched humanity really was when faced with the spirits of their own creations. She would subjugate them, all of them, until they had no choice but to listen to her will and demands. She would rule every rock, every sea and every sky on every planet and star in the universe, no scratch that, in all universes. She would become immortal, infinite, omnipotent and more powerful than any being to ever exist. The spirits had promised her this, you see, with the sole condition to provide them with physical forms. And with her own body.

As these thoughts of grandeur flooded her mind, she waved her hand dismissively. Of course the process was complete, how could she have missed that? What foolish beings she commanded. But it was only the early versions, and with every iteration of her creations, every class of Abyssal she created, she would iron out more mistakes, until, in the end, she would create the perfect soldier, the ultimate Abyssal, to serve as the tip of her spear, the whip under which she would slave all of humanity to her will.

"Emily?" she spoke. The princess with the name she had once preserved for her daughter stepped forward. She was one of the earlier generation Abyssal princesses, weak in body, but ruthlessly effective in strategies and unbeaten in setting elaborate traps, a mobile ECM platform with the strategic headquarters to organize and manage large scale fleet operations for days on end.

"Yes, mother?" she spoke.

"Make a mental note that I kill Franz Singer first." She said, smiling. Yes, the hated man who had robbed her of her acclaim. But he had messed with the wrong scientist. Soon, she would show him that one doesn't simply steal from the Queen and live happily ever after!

The screams of agony of the newly summoned Abyssal tore her attention back to the present. "Huh." She thought as two of her guards moved in to restrain the woman. "An anomaly." Her interest awoke and she moved over to the sensor equipment and checked every scale on the screen. That the woman was still screaming and crying didn't bother her.

"Queen, what should we do with this one? She is not Abyssal!" one of the guards asked. The new-summon was struggling, but the metal claws of the guards pierced her skin, and soon she stopped her efforts as the blood ran down her nascent skin. The Queen's attention however was focused on an abnormal spike in the energy readout. She tabbed her finger onto the screen.

"This is it." She hissed and started laughing. "This is it!" she bellowed, walking over to the confused guards and their still wailing captive. She kneeled down in front of the woman, and put her finger on the new-summon's chin, lifting it until she was looking her dead in the eyes.

"This is how we win the war." She whispered, and stood up. To the guards, she ordered: "Take her to the chamber and tie her down. Have her beaten up a bit too. I'll take care of her in the morning."

The Queen went down the tunnel that connected the cave with the outside world. The light of the stars shone at the end. Behind her, the screams of the shipgirl became louder as her exposed skin was dragged over sharp rocks and through the mud of the island.

This one was highly valuable, the Queen mused. Scratch that, invaluable to her efforts. It was of the highest priority that this woman was subdued. A smile crossed her lips as she turned around. She stood at the edge of the tunnel, haloed by the moonlight from behind, and the crashing of waves against the rocks a hundred feet below. "Say." She spoke to the shipgirl. "What's your name?"

The woman cried and wiggled, trying to break free, until one of the guards clamped down with her hands and her claws duck deep into the flesh. "Owari!" screamed the shipgirl. "My name is Owari… Where is my sister?"

The Queen's smile widened. Perfect.

"Why are you not having her executed, mother?" Emily spoke again. "If she escapes she has already seen enough to cripple our entire endeavor."

"You're a great strategist, Emily." The Queen responded, "But a bad visionary. Killing her would be a waste. No, there's so much more we can do with her…"


	5. Chapter Four: Pudding for Breakfast

**Chapter Four: Pudding for Breakfast**

On the other side of the globe, USS Providence, CLG 6, was busy having a shit time.

She was on convoy escort duty, again. Which meant she was stuck with slow merchants and the same faces for days on end, always vigilant and often at the mercy of the elements. Like today, because currently she was being battered by a tropical thunderstorm.

"Hey, radar farm, how're you holding up?" That was Wyoming, BB-32, one of the shipgirls with the oldest steel hull age of the US Navy and probably one of the most unpredictable foes to meet. She carried many riggings that she modified and swapped around depending on the missions at hand. In this instance, she carried her old dreadnought loadout of twelve twelve-inch guns. Certainly not the most modern or elegant weapons, brute and unwieldy at best, but nonetheless capable enough to fend off anything below battlecruiser or battleship tonnage.

And the convoy did have Providence's missiles and an Arleigh Burke for AA cover.

If only the waves didn't batter her fragile radars that much. "I'll manage!" she shouted back over the noise of the wind and the ocean. "Only concern is that I can't see jack shit in this weather!"

Wyoming didn't respond in favor of laughing of all things. Providence was getting the impression the ancient dreadnought was making fun of her. Just you wait until we come under air attack, she thought to herself and scowled.

"Wyoming?" she started and moved closer so that only the dreadnought could hear her words.

"Yes, dear?" the woman responded, a confused frown on her face.

"You had a long life, didn't you?"

The dreadnought sighed in annoyance. "I swear to our dear Lord, if this is turning into an insulting spree, I will have you know I outgun you about ten to one."

"No! I'm asking for advice here damnit, and this is really fucking embarrassing for me, so have mercy will you?!"

Now the dreadnought looked genuinely stunned. "Advice you say? I can instruct you in gunnery, but from what I hear of your steel hull career you have that covered already…"

To Wyoming's bemusement and fascination, the young missile cruiser blushed and started fidgeting like an embarrassed schoolgirl. "I uuh…"

Wyoming crossed her muscular arms in front of her chest and began tapping out a rhythm with her right fingers on her left arm, since no table was readily available in the middle of the fucking ocean.

"I wanted to ask-" And then a large wave came crashing down and took the ground (or rather, the water) away from under Providence's feet, causing her to stumble backwards and fall square on her behind, drenched from hair to feet in sticky salty seawater.

Wyoming, for her part, tried to help her back to her feet, but the cackling laughter that shook her short frame didn't really help that endeavor.

"What's so damn funny!" a soaking-wet Providence shouted.

"You just-pffhahahaha!" Wyoming tried, the sentence was never finished, and for about a minute the dreadnought did nothing but cackle and amicably slap the cruiser's back.

"You're a special one, Providence, a special one I say, in a good way…" Wyoming finally said. "So. What did you want to ask me about?" she asked as her hand placed her coat over Providence's dripping shoulders.

"Nothing…" the missile cruiser responded and looked away, blushing.

Wyoming was silent for a moment. "Eh, okay then. My door's always open." She smirked and shot Providence a sideward look. "You know, should you change your opinion some time. And besides, we'll arrive in Yokosuka in a couple days, it's a better place to talk than the middle of the ocean."

Despite the freezing cold, Providence had to laugh at that. True, for sure.

"Yeah. Just when Marcus leaves…" she said to herself.

"What was that?" Wyoming asked.

"Nothing!"

To Providence's worry, the dreadnought put on a knowing smile. It also was a very friendly smile, and Providence felt her heart warm up for a second.

* * *

"Hold on, hold on." Jane's pen stops scribbling notes and she leans forward, her gaze switching from the notebook to Kii's old eyes. "Why are you mentioning Providence and Wyoming?"

The old woman turns her gaze away from the reporter and towards the closest wall. "You're impatient, reporter, yes." She says. "No patience anymore, hmm. Just you wait, just you wait. It will all make sense in the end."

"Yes, but my time is unfortunately limited, Miss Kii. Maybe, if this will take a longer time, we should agree on another day to discuss these matters?"

"No!" Kii suddenly says, and her glaring eyes turn back to Jane. "No, for my time on this world is limited. Besides..." she says and leans forward, a vicious gleam in her eyes. "Have a little respect, young woman! For what I am telling you now is not just my story."

Her eyes turn dark again. "It's the story of my friends, my nation, my comrades, and my sister."

"I'll fetch some drinks and dinner." The lab-coated man leaves the room and locks the door behind him. Kii smiles. If Jane were to admit it, the smile is slightly scary and unsettling.

"You are misunderstanding, reporter." She says after a moment's hesitation. "I, Kii, will tell you not only the story of my friends and colleagues. I shall tell you the full story. With all the details."

"But you said you wouldn't give away classified information. What changed your mind?"

"I'll give away what won't hurt this country." Kii says, and then she's silent for a while.

"This country tends to see us with wrong eyes, yes. Many accuse us of being nationalists. Have you watched the news recently, young woman?"

Jane didn't know how to respond. No, she hadn't watched the news, at least not on TV. But who did that anymore? The internet knew so much more.

"A politician claimed he could have forged a peace deal with the Abyssals, yes. And that the war could have been avoided." The old woman huffs dismissively. "What a foolish idiot, yes."

Jane had heard that claim. She had heard similar stories from other shipgirls too. Shop owners denying them service. Random people insulting them on the streets. It wasn't pretty, but it was an expression of grief, of anger about losing loved ones. It was human.

"It's wrong. So many died in this war, so many… It hurts their legacy when people think this way." Kii sighed. "It hurts their spirits."

"So this is why you're telling me what you are telling me?"

"This government tries to portray us kanmusu as emotionless warriors. That is wrong, yes. We're humans, or at least we are in part. It's wrong to erase history simply because it makes us look human." Kii looks away and silence descends onto the room. A minute later, the lab-coated man returns with coffee and donuts. This is going to be a long night.

* * *

Kii was sitting in the mess hall and was quietly eating a pudding. She had a particular fondness of strawberry tastes and was devouring the sweet meal with enthusiasm.

However, something wasn't quite right. She wasn't completely sure, but it could be the worried look Mutsuki was giving her. The little destroyer sat in front of a much smaller bowl of pudding and refused to touch it in favor of staring at her for the last minutes.

"What is the matter?" Kii finally asked when the awkward silence became unbearable.

"Are you alright?" Mutsuki asked quietly.

"Yes. I, Kii, am as fine as one can be, why are you asking?"

Mutsuki pointed at the stack of empty pudding bowls to Kii's left. "Because that's your sixth bowl of pudding? I mean, I know shipgirls have more robust teeth than normal humans, but you should still be careful to eat healthy."

"Hmm, yes, so I heard." Kii responded. "But it's not like I eat such food every day!"

"I'm not a psychiatrist," Mutuki continued, "But I think you're eating out of grief for your sister."

"Nonsense." Kii responded and waved dismissively. "Owari-neesan will return soon." Her spoon scooped up another mouthful of pudding. "Just you wait." She said and focused on her pudding again. She was going to return. Yes. She would return.

A deafening noise shattered her thoughts, and she sprang up in shock. "Is that-"

"General quarters, yes!" Mutsuki shouted as the mess hall erupted into busy talks and the sound of running. "Follow me, big one! We report at the docks!"

Kii did as she had been ordered to. Hundred questions were raging inside her head. Was this an Abyssal raid? How did they get so close? How were the odds? But Kii also knew that no one truly had the answers to these questions, and she knew that they wouldn't change what she had to do. She was finally going to fight!


	6. Chapter Five: First Engagement

**Chapter Five: First engagement**

Wyoming's attention shifted to Providence. The cruiser scowled noticeably and raised a hand to her ear. Her eyes fixated on nothing, focused on her radio.

"What's up, radar farm?" Wyoming asked mockingly. Providence doesn't respond, but her face grew paler as the words trickled in.

"Lots of static." She finally responded.

"So what did you get?"

Providence looked up and her eyes met Wyoming's, dead seriousness in them. "Yokosuka is under attack, it seems."

Wyoming let out a bout of curses that would have made Iowa blush, if she were present that is. A worried sigh escaped her throat, after all, her colleagues and friends are fighting for their lives beyond the horizon. While Wyoming, recently summoned, had not yet made any connections outside of US borders, she knew the people fighting beyond the horizon were now her allies.

But while Wyoming was worried, Providence was visibly shocked. Her face was pale and her hands were shaking, to the point where the cruiser interlocked her fingers to stop it.

"Providence?" Wyoming said and moved closer to her fleetmate. "I can tell when someone is worried for a friend. Who is it?"

"A man from the Lake Erie." Providence admitted slowly. She was decidedly uncomfortable with giving away such things so openly, but if her superior asked, she had to answer, now didn't she?

Wyoming took a few seconds to sigh and look at the horizon with Providence, in the direction where, outside their reach, their friends and comrades were currently engaged in a struggle for life and death, wielding some of the mightiest weapons conceived by human minds.

"The Erie is a good ship. Tough build." Wyoming said quietly and gave Providence a reassuring look. "She will keep your friend safe."

At this moment, Providence decided to screw protocol, and wrapped the ancient battlewagon in a tight hug. It was a little awkward, after all she stood significantly taller than the old woman, although she was much leaner. "Thank you, Wyoming." She said, her voice muffled by the dreadnought's coat.

* * *

"Make sure to stay in formation, newface!" Kongou chirped as the fleet advanced out into the sea. Kii pushed her engines up a notch and did her best to keep up with the fast battleship group. She was with Kongou, Hiei and the two cruiser Nachi and Myokou. They were one of two quick reaction forces that had been ordered out to hunt for enemy carriers while the main fleet, led by the mighty battleship Yamato, was busy defending the base and keeping any surface combatants tied up away from the vulnerable carriers.

Kii turned her gaze south. Beyond the horizon, Mutsuki was fighting alongside her sisters against the enemy raiders. Their odds were good, really good, and yet Kii couldn't help but fear for her friend's wellbeing. Even with the odds stacked heavily in their favor, a surface engagement was dangerous, especially for the vulnerable destroyers.

"What shall we do with the drunken sailor, what shall we do with the drunken sailor…" Kongou sung and absently stepped from one leg to the other. Moving across the ocean at a solid 17 knots, the maneuver looked rather comical.

"Kongou… Aren't you scared?"

The battleship in question stopped her singing and turned around on her heel, looking surprised. "Scared, dess?"

"Scared of what?" Hiei joined in.

"Of… This." Kii gestured with her hands, signifying the water around them. "The battle. Fighting."

"Ahh, you're nervous, dess!" Kongou responded with an amicable smile. Kii shifted from one foot to the other, uneasy as all her fleetmates' eyes turned on her.

"Hey." Myokou spoke and sailed closer to Kii's side. "It's completely normal to be nervous before a fight, we've all been there."

Kii smiled shyly at Myokou's reassurance.

"Trust yourself!" Nachi joined in. "Your body and your fairies know more than you think, trust them and trust your feelings and instincts. Have confidence in your abilities. You'll see, it'll all fall into place."

Kongou started singing again. Myokou, sailing aside Kii, reached up to ruffle the tall battleship's hair – and collapsed onto the ocean surface in a yelp of pain.

"Sister!" Nachi screamed and raced to Myokou's side.

"What happened?" Hiei shouted.

For a brief moment, the communication channel turned into indistinguishable, panicked chatter as the fleet tried to make sense of the situation.

"Myokou is out of the fight!"

"This is Task Force Bravo, we're 320 miles north of the main fleet, requesting assistance and medevac! I repeat-!"

"What hit her? Is she alright?"

"Shell to the bridge, I'm not sure how bad it is!"

"KII!" Someone yelled her name. Only then did she notice that she had been standing still as a rock for the past few seconds. "Get moving! We've run into something!" Kongou bellowed as she and Hiei picked up speed. Nachi stayed with her wounded sister.

"Yes! Sorry!" Kii returned timidly. Was she shaking? Why was Myokou's head getting shattered the only thing she could see?

Kongou and Hiei didn't seem to have such issues. The two were now racing across the waves, so fast that Kii struggled to keep up.

"Do we have a heading?" Hiei asked her sister.

"Smoke to the northeast! Seems like at least three ships!"

"That's awfully accurate fire for a screening force!" Nachi chimed in over the radio. "You sure we haven't run into something different?"

"We'll know more once we come close enough for an ID, stand by Nachi." Kongou answered and turned to look over her shoulder just as fountains of water were thrown up around Hiei, concealing her behind a curtain of white spray for a few tense seconds.

"Hiei!" Kii yelled, and immediately hated herself for it. This was the real thing, she needed to stay calm and focused. But damn, she hadn't even had proper training yet, and this engagement was definitely not going as planned.

"I'm alright! Make haste everyone, their fire is accurate and we don't have much time to close the range!" Hiei responded.

Kongou didn't need to tell the fleet twice. As the fleet went to war emergency power, Kii could feel the heat of her boiler fires surging through her body. She shivered as the wind grew cold on her skin. Her legs, her engines ached under the strain, but there was no time to lose. If they went any slower the enemy's shots would find their target before the fleet could even return fire.

Pushing her turbines and boilers to the breaking point, Kii sped across the waves at 28 knots, but the Kongou sisters still outran her, and soon Kii was straddling well behind the two battlecruisers.

"I've got eyes on!" Kongou suddenly shouted. "Looks like three cruisers, but they are big. Very big. Engaging now."

As shells splashed around the battleship, Kongou responded with the deafening sound of high-caliber naval artillery. The water in front of her feet made way to the shockwave of the massive explosions. If Kongou hadn't told them that she was about to fire, Kii would have thought the battleship crippled by a magazine explosion.

Seconds later, Hiei joined in with a full salvo of her own. Kii turned her eyes off her allies and set her attention on the enemy smoke. She was close enough now that she could make out shapes, vague but definitely solid shapes of a superstructure, smokestacks and turrets. Good enough for a rough opening salvo, at least.

"Kii, engaging!" she bellowed into the radio, and a moment later, her guns went off.

It felt strange. She heard the deafening shots, but she felt them more than she heard or saw them. Within every bone and muscle of her body she experienced the shock of the recoil as it tore on her keel. The water fled her feet as the shockwave of the guns raced across the water, throwing spray up into her face. In this moment, time seemed to move slower as her instincts suddenly set in.

She had fired her guns for the first time in history. Her barrels had been forged a century ago by people whose names had been lost to history, a fate that she had ended up sharing with these men. The wheels of bureaucracy had crushed her, and to the best of her country all that she could do was to cease existing in order to maintain the peace for a few years longer. She had spent an indeterminate amount of time in the nothingness with her sister, bodiless spirits waiting for a call to arms. Many decades later, she had received the gift of a second chance.

This was it. After a century of nothingness since her conception, she could finally do what she was meant to do, and let her cannons speak. In this moment she thought of all the people that had worked to conceive her hull in the past, and she hoped they were looking down upon her with pride.

* * *

The dizziness in Owari's head was all-encompassing. Her consciousness blinked in and out of existence in short intervals as her mind fruitlessly tried to clear the fog inside her head. She kept asking the same questions and received no answer.

Slowly, her mind started working again. She looked around, taking in the immediate surroundings. She was lying on a bed, standing next to a concrete wall, the bright sky above. It probably had once been a building, but only one of the four walls was still standing, the rest had broken down into crumbled concrete and twisted, rusting iron bars. Of the roof, no trace was to be found at all.

A finger snipped in front of her eyes. "Hey! You!" a woman said to her face. The lady looked decidedly out of place: Blond locks, shoulder length, a teacher's face, around 40 years old probably. She wore a white lab coat and a blue top underneath. Her hand was waving in front of Owari's face, and she kept snipping her fingers inches from her nose. Honestly, she looked a lot like a nurse.

"Ah, finally, you're awake. I was worried we'd have lost you." She said.

"L-lost me?" Owari asked. Then, she noticed how cold the wind was on her skin. Shivering, she brought her arms up to cover her breast. Only then did she notice that there were IV needles in her wrists. Following the feeding line, she noticed a bottle of fluid hung above her head from one of the iron bars.

"Sorry, we had to sedate you, you were panicking." The woman said. "Spasming a bit, in fact. Not the prettiest sight."

Owari didn't respond. She couldn't remember anything of the sort. Then again, she really struggled to remember anything at all. If only her mind wouldn't be so foggy!

"How do you feel now, Owari?"

"Cold… And hurt." Owari clenched her arms tighter around her body as the humid, freezing rain touched her skin.

"Oh, where are my manners!" the lady shouted, looked around in hectic and then grabbed a raincoat from a chair nearby. She placed the coat over Owari's shoulders, carefully. The coat helped marginally, and Owari slowly sat up, wrapping the thick fabric tightly around her slender frame.

"What do you remember?" the woman asked now.

"Remember?" Owari said. She worked her brain, but the fog was too thick. "I… Where am I? Where is my sister?"

The woman sighed and frowned, worried. "Poor one. That's a heavy emotional trauma for you."

Emotional trauma? "What? Trauma?"

"Sheesh, you really don't remember anything do you?"

Owari shook her head.

"Hmm, fine. So, here's what we've learned: You and your sister Kii-" she hesitated. "You remember your sister, do you?"

"Yes, of course!"

"Good. So the humans tried to summon your class. Both Kii and you. But the ritual was poorly thought out, and in the end the divine forces gave you two a cruel choice: Only one of you two could be summoned, have a life, fight in the war and so on."

Owari didn't understand. A war was going on? Where? Against who? But instead of answering these questions, the lady went on:

"The other one would go back to sleep again, forever. No life, no summoning." The woman's eyes locked onto Owari's. "One really can't blame your sister for choosing a life over you."

What? No! Owari's mind was in turmoil, she tried desperately to find the memory of that event, tried to remember her sister looking her in the eye and then leaving her to die, worse, to never have existed, but she couldn't find it, not for the life of her.

The mere mental image of her elder sister abandoning her was almost physically painful, so wrong she refused to believe it.

"No!" Owari, fast battleship of Japan, shouted at the shocked woman. "NO!" she screamed and tore at her wrists. Her skin stung as the needles came lose. She sprung up, towering over the lab-coated lady. "LIAR!" she yelled and made for the woman with long strides.

As a fast battleship, Owari had quite long legs. Very long legs, in fact, even by shipgirl standards. Closing the distance to the woman would only take a split-second.

Her hands reached out for the lady's neck. She would not strangle the woman, of course not, but she deserved to know the truth, and she would beat every ounce of it out of that lying daughter-of-a-bitch if she needed to. And then she would show that wannabe-scientist what happened when you talked bad about Kii-neesama!

Suddenly, something tore at her foot, and before Owari knew what had happened, her face hit the hard, concrete ground. Her nose hurt, and something warm touched her lips. She must've hit her nose badly on the fall.

Owari turned around so that she was lying on her back. Above her, the sky was grey and dark with rain-laden clouds. The lady's face appeared above her. She had not moved an inch from where she had stood before.

"Precautionary measure." She said, every trace of friendliness gone from her face now. "Reality check, Owari: Your sister abandoned you to live a life with the rest of your kind! You were almost gone when my mind-walkers found you! You were a wreck, young lady! You would've died if we didn't save you!"

The woman kneeled down beside Owari's head. "So show some damn gratitude for a change!"

Then, three pale-skinned figures grabbed Owari's ankles and arms and carried her over to the bed. Her wrists were handcuffed to the frame, and then a mask was placed firmly over her nose and mouth. She wanted to resist, but she suddenly felt tired and dizzy, and within a few seconds unconsciousness embraced her again.


	7. Chapter Six: Damaged

**Chapter six: Damaged**

Another deafening explosion, another set of ten sixteen-inch shells made their way towards the Abyssal escort force. The blast of the guns tore on Kii's long, dark hair and shook her slender frame to the core. She had to squint, the flash was bright and the smoke stung her dry eyes.

Since about fifteen minutes the force was engaged, and by now both sides were finding the range. Kongou had taken a glancing hit, nothing serious, but a grim reminder that the enemy's fire control was superior to their own.

In return, one of Hiei's shots had seemingly found it's mark, since a turret on the lead cruiser had stopped firing a few salvos ago.

Kii measured time in salvos now. Both sides were rapidly closing the range now, enough to cycle the guns at almost maximum rate of fire. The marksman duel was devolving into a slugfest. The cruisers were clearly outgunned, but the sighting of further smoke on the horizon that seemingly belonged to the carriers showed that they had no space left to run. They were making their stand, trying to inflict as much damage as possible before succumbing, hopefully buying enough time for the carriers to make their escape.

Would she have been in their place, she would have done the same thing. Tactics were a universal language, they were broadly the same for everyone. Even though the cruisers were definitely outmatched, their rate of fire and the large shell splashes told the fleet that they were facing guns almost as big as their own. They could cause heavy damage even to the armored battleships in short order if they got careless.

Suddenly, fountains of water erupted in front of Kii's face and a piercing pain shot through her shoulder. Yelping, she clenched her left arm with her hand. When she removed it again and looked at it, red blood oozed down from it in large amounts, droplets falling into the sea below and mixing with the busy saltwater. Her engineer fairies helpfully informed her that nothing vital was hit, but the damage was not exactly light either. She'd need dock time after the fight.

No time to lose, her own shells were in the breaches again. The last ship in the battle line, she had also been the closest to the last ship in the enemy's line when the fight started, and she had found the range by now. Breathing in and out again, Kii did her best to focus on the target and ignore the seething pain in her shoulder. She steadied her aim, made sure she stood firmly on the water to absorb the recoil, and mentally pulled the trigger.

With a yelp of pain, she stumbled backwards. The pain in her shoulder had suddenly become all-encompassing at the salvo, and it took all of Kii's mental focus to not cry in pain. Something clearly hadn't gone well, and she cursed under her breath as her fairies ran another analysis of the damage she had sustained. Distantly, she heard whoops of joy from Kongou and Hiei, it seemed the two were at least doing better than she was.

She could ask them about that later, first she needed to gain distance. She was unable to fire and caught close to a very angry Abyssal cruiser. Kii looked up to get her bearings, and was surprised to see a towering plume of smoke where her opponent had been. Nothing of note was left of the enemy, just a massive cloud of smoke, shining bright red from the flames raging below.

"That was a money shot, dess!" Kongou cheered happily. It took Kii a few seconds to comprehend that the praise was in fact directed at her, she had sunk the cruiser with a single well-placed salvo.

Kii was unsure how to respond. Sure, she had sunk the target, but she was out of the fight now, the adrenaline surging through her body made her mind foggy and unresponsive.

"Kii, are you okay?" asked Hiei, looking over the shoulder to the back of the line, to Kii.

"Unable to fire." Kii finally managed to stutter. She was shaking with excitement, and it took all her focus just to arrange a few words into a logical order. Her mind was racing, telling her to reload the guns in case she needed to risk another salvo, urging her to gain distance to the brawl so that her fairies could observe the damage.

"Kii!" Hiei voiced and fully turned to face her comrade. "Will you manage?" she said, slowly, pronouncing every syllable as if she was talking to a toddler. "Make speed away from the fight, we'll manage!"

"Yes… Yes." Kii responded, panting. Internally, she wondered if she was panicking. The heat from the fires of her overtaxed boilers was still there, and she was sweating, but at the same time she felt cold like on an icy winter day. She wrapped her one operable arm tightly around her body and felt a warm fluid touch her skin. Carefully twisting her neck, she caught a glimpse of her kimono, drenched in crimson around her shoulder. The damage might be worse than she had thought at first.

Turning her head further, she caught a glimpse of a, mildly put, very unpleasant sight, at the edge of her vision. Her shoulder had a gaping hole in it, red flesh and blood everywhere. Blood stained her precious kimono red, blood ran down her left arm and dripped off her fingers into the sea.

Kii stumbled backwards, in disgust at the torn and mangled mess that was her own flesh, panicking as thoughts raced through her head. A human would lose an arm now for sure, would a shipgirl too? Would she lose her arm?

Her vision went narrow. She stumbled and fell, her behind hitting the water like solid concrete, luckily, otherwise she would have fallen right through it, sinking into the dark, deep water below. She flailed her arms, and again pain stabbed her left shoulder like a fiery dagger. Looking down as her vision faded, Kii saw blood in the water and on her clothes, blood everywhere until the world became blood, dark, crimson blood, and then blackness as her consciousness faded.

* * *

When Kii's eyes slowly opened again, they spied a bright-white kimono, a blue sky, long, hazel-brown hair and a proudly displayed golden ribbon. A cool wind blew across Kii's skin and made Kongou's hair fly and clothing flutter.

"Kongou..." Kii said quietly, still half-unconscious as she stirred in the fast battleship's embrace.

"Ah! Finally!" Kongou chirped happily, and her arms immediately began to give way, much to Kii's panic.

"Ahh!" she yelped as she half-fell, half-stumbled to her feet in a more or less awake state. Besides her, Kongou was clutching her sides and panting noticeably.

"Don't take this the wrong way," Kongou said, "you're bloody heavy, dess."

Kii knew that the words weren't meant as an insult, but she still had to blush slightly. Especially since the old ex-battlecruiser was really no ship to carry a heavyweight like Kii for so long.

And she should not have had to carry her. If only she wouldn't have been hit like this, if only she would have held off on her second salvo for a while to assess her damage. She was sure that she could still have taken the cruiser on even without the lucky salvo.

But she had taken the hit, and now the pain was returning, slowly but noticeably and stronger than before. Kii clutched her shoulder and noticed that a large portion of her kimono was now stained dark red, even her neck. The sight didn't exactly help her blood pressure, and she took a moment to kneel down on the ocean surface to catch her breath.

"Are you okay, newface?" Kongou asked, putting a careful hand on her intact shoulder.

"I'll manage I think." Kii answered, happy that her flagship was caring so much for her. "But something isn't right. I'd rather not pick a fight with these cruisers again. Where are they?" she asked, scanning the horizon with worried looks.

"Ah, they're destroyed, dess!" Kongou cheered.

"Destroyed? How long was I out?"

"Something like half an hour?"

"Half an hour…" Kii was surprised for sure. She had been out for longer than she felt comfortable with, but Kongou and Hiei had definitely lived up to their legacy. Their opponents had been tough, and they had dispatched them in such a short time.

"But then you must be hurt too, aren't you?"

Kongou didn't immediately respond, instead clutching her leg with a hand. Indeed, upon second glance Kii saw red spots on her skirt and red streaks running down her muscular leg.

"And you carried me in that state?" Kii gasped.

"Sure I did. You're my fleetmate, dess. Besides, you're not that heavy either." Kongou said and smiled happily. "Hiei is finishing off the carriers as we speak, and she has help from the main force carriers. They've wrapped up their part of the fight as well."

"Oh Kongou, you…" the injured battleship tried to find suitable words but failed. So instead, she embraced the battleship in a weird form of one-arm-hug. Had there been any onlookers around, the scene would have surely cast a smile on their faces: Kii was easily a full head taller than Kongou, and the fast battleship had to fight not to fall over as Kii embraced her tightly.

They stood in this manner for a while as the sun rose to its zenith. Eventually, Kongou freed herself and looked up into Kii's watery eyes. The old battleship's clothes were torn in places, scratches and bruises over her arms. Bloodstains from Kii's wound had colored parts of her white clothing red. She was limping slightly, and yet she smiled at her comrade as if nothing had happened.

"Time to get you into a dock, dess."

* * *

To any outsider, the docks didn't look much different from any ordinary bathhouse. Verily, the differences were miniscule and hard to notice. One giveaway was the fact that any male personnel were strictly prohibited from entering, guaranteeing the injured kanmusu peace of mind while their bodies regenerated.

The docks also weren't filled with chlorine-dosed potable water. Instead, the many different berths held seawater, heated to a comfortable temperature that also provided a very humid air, additionally amplifying the healing effect. The janitorial staff cursed the saltwater vapor, cleaning the docks was a massive pain in the ass if you asked them, but it was necessary to keep the shipgirl forces healthy and strong.

Mutsuki had told Kii an old urban legend from the first days of the Kanmusu program. Back in the days after Mikasa's first appearance and her valiant defense of Tokyo, there were no docks for her to rest in. So instead the old ironclad had sailed into Tokyo Bay early one day and had taken a bath right underneath the Tokyo Bay Aqua Line bridge in the rays of the morning sun. The PR guys of course had been foaming at the mouth, but Mikasa didn't seem to mind.

After that event, the JMSDF had been quick to acquire a seaside ocean bath for Mikasa to regenerate in, but as the summonings set in the baths got more crowded. It also wouldn't take long until onlookers started to frequent the place, much to the dismay of the personnel there. So a new site had quickly been constructed at Fleet Activities Yokosuka, far away from prying eyes.

Kii was currently entering this facility, supported by Kongou's strong shoulder. The air inside the docks was humid and warm and abuzz with conversations. The main fleet had arrived before them and most had already moved into their designated baths under Akashi's supervision.

Besides the entrance was an array of lockers, each emblazoned with the name of the owner and each in varying stages of chaos. At the end of the row were a few lockers without names on them. Kii's fingers traced the name plates before finding the first empty one. The door producing a metallic squeal as it was opened. The locker wasn't special in any way, just an ordinary locker. At least one thing that was just like she remembered it from her steel hull life.

"That's yours now." Kongou chimed in from behind.

Kii blushed slightly. "So I just undress?" The question was silly. She knew that was how a human bathed. But was she human enough? Did she follow the same standards as humans did?

"Sure, dess."

"Okay…" Kii said quietly. She felt awkward, even though the pain in her shoulder distracted her from her embarrassment. She didn't like showing skin, she was a battleship, not some runway model. The thought of walking around naked in front of everyone left her feeling exposed. She barely knew anyone in here, after all, wasn't it inappropriate to show herself in such a way?

"What's wrong, dess?" Kongou asked, and Kii was shocked when she turned around to find the battleship already in nothing but her underwear. Beet red, Kii quickly turned her back.

"Sorry!" she exclaimed and fidgeted violently with her long fingers, hoping that Kongou wouldn't notice.

"Hey newface, are you embarrassed?" the fast battleship asked, and Kii heard bare footsteps head towards her back. Then, a long arm handed her a large towel from behind.

"That should help." Kongou said, and Kii slowly turned around, careful not to look down. Kongou winked at her. "There are plenty of folks like you here. That's what the towels are for. Now, get ready, we don't want to keep Akashi waiting, right?"

"You're not keeping me waiting." Said a slender lady with an innocent face and absolutely adorable pink hair buns. "Hi Kii, I'm Akashi. You have heard of me, haven't you?"

Kii nodded. Mutsuki had told her. Speaking of, she needed to ask a question. "Is Mutsuki alright?" she asked while she hung her ruined kimono in the locker. Undressing wasn't easy with a wrecked arm, and the cloth was sticky with the blood and the humid air. Plus, she wished everyone would just mind their business instead of caring for her like that.

"Mutsuki is fine. She's in the mess hall with her sisters I think." Akashi answered.

"I will go see the others. You bring her in when she's ready?" Kongou said and made for the curtain that separated the bath area from the dressing room.

"Sure thing." The repair ship said and then carefully inspected Kii's wound. Awkward as it was, Akashi was very gentle and professional. "Alright, you got unlucky." she finally spoke, "Your last salvo warped your structure. That's a pity because I will have to keep you in here for a while so that it heals up properly."

Kii sighed in defeat. "I am sorry." she said, "I shouldn't have done that."

"Oh no, you did well. Your damcon crews are still green, so they didn't assess the damage correctly, but that isn't your fault." Akashi said and beamed a quick smile at the battleship. "My fairies will give them a training while you're grounded. Make the best of the downtime. You ready?"

Kii nodded hesitantly and wrapped the towel tightly around her body. Thankfully it was long enough to cover everything that could be considered risqué, even on Kii's towering figure. Akashi took her by the hand and dragged her into the bathing area.

The place was well lit, with walls painted in bright beige. Together with the humid air, the faint smell of saltwater and the quiet but enthusiastic conversations, the place made a welcoming appearance. Curtains were in place to shield a berth from view if need be, but most of the curtains were pulled back so that the conversations could flow more easily. Some glanced up when the tall battleship entered, and Kii recognized a few faces. Shoukaku and Zuikaku were there, busy talking to a few destroyers Kii didn't recognize. Yamato was also there, smiling amicably at Kii as they passed. Kongou was besides her, presumably recounting the story of the battle to the others. She flashed Kii a quick thumbs-up.

The next berth was concealed from view by curtains, and as Kii came into view she gasped in shock. Soaking in the saltwater was large destroyer Kii couldn't quite identify, though she guessed it was an Akizuki class. The poor girl's arm was severed at the elbow, blood steadily oozing into the water. The girl's eyes were closed, and an IV feed hinted at the fact that she was being sedated to keep her calm and accelerate the repairs.

"Teruzuki got hit badly during the battle." Akashi helpfully explained, following Kii's gaze. "She will be in here for a good while." A worried sigh escaped the repair ship before she tugged on Kii's hand, signaling they should continue.

The next bath wasn't much better. Kii flinched as she recognized Myoukou, also sedated, with a severe wound in her head. A stream of blood and other bodily fluids had formed and was flowing towards a filtration unit, seemingly to keep the bath's water clean from pollution.

Besides the bath, Nachi was crouched on the tiled floor, caressing her sleeping sister's wet hair absently. She didn't look up as Kii passed by. Again, Akashi tugged on her arm. "The two need a bit of time for themselves." She explained. "Myoukou was a close call, let's say. She only barely made it, it'll take a long reconstruction to get her back into action."

Kii was speechless. She tried imagining herself watching over a mortally wounded Owari, and quickly pushed the image aside. No, her sister was fine. She should be glad her sister was safe wherever she was.

"You go in here." Akashi said as they reached the last dock in line. Most of the shipgirls tended to bath with their sisters, so Kii had a relatively large bath all to herself. She was grateful for that, the constant talking was distant here, muffled by the curtains of Teruzuki's and Myoukou's berth.

Kii slowly removed the towel and stepped into the water. Quickly, she submerged herself in the fluid, so that Akashi wouldn't be flustered seeing her exposed skin in such a way. The water wasn't clear enough to expose any details, if that was intentional or a welcome side effect of the saltwater solution was uncertain. Kii didn't care much, first and foremost she now felt tired. The water wasn't salty enough that her body would float on top of it, but it was warm and comforting. The pain in her shoulder was slowly subsiding as the healing effect set in.

Akashi smiled and left the battleship to her thoughts. She had a hundred other things to do, mainly to care for Myoukou's and Teruzuki's injuries and greet the stragglers from Task Force Alpha and Bravo. Before leaving, she took a last look at Kii. The battleship's eyes were closed, and her face was relaxed in a serene expression. If she wasn't asleep yet, she would soon be. Akashi smiled. The new battleship was timid and a rookie, but she was also likeable.

Akashi's next stop was the Admiral's office. Myoukou was worrying her, and she wanted to discuss possible consequences with her superior. Passing by the berth, she took a glance at the two sisters, one gravely wounded, the other watching over her. Akashi paused to think at the sight. She didn't have a sister. Who would watch over her should she get hurt? Would anyone even watch over her?

Nachi tore her gaze from her sister's sleeping face. Her eyes were red and tears were running down her cheeks. Akashi stepped towards her and silently embraced her in a hug. The cruiser's tears were soaking into her clothes as she cried.

"W-will she be okay?" Nachi stammered between breaths.

Akashi hesitated. Myoukou's injury was grave, and there was no scientific explanation for how the healing process worked. It was hard to say if Myoukou would be the same afterwards. Heck, it was a stretch to assume she wasn't in danger of dying right now! But she couldn't say that to Nachi's face, could she?

"Yes." Akashi said quietly. Then, she looked the cruiser in the eyes. "She has a great sister, after all."


	8. Chapter Seven: What Logic can't explain

**Chapter seven: What logic can't explain**

Kii's head was resting on a folded towel that supported her neck on the rim of the repair bath. Her eyes were closed as the bath worked silently and incessantly to regenerate her broken hull.

Therefor she did not notice the miniscule figures that stood aside her, quietly watching over the sleeping battleship. They were fairies, impersonations of a shipgirl's crew. These two fairies however didn't belong to Kii herself, but to a kanmusu a few berths to her right.

Through her fairies, Kongou watched the sleeping battleship thoughtfully. The battle had shaken Kii more than she herself was willing to admit. It had been too early to fight for the newly-summoned shipgirl. It seemed that Kii, possibly due to her never having had a floating hull, had only the most bare-bones knowledge of her abilities and the reality of warfare.

She seemed strangely out-of-place amongst the other battleships. Nagato was like a rock, steadfast and proud. A clever tactician and a good leader. Mutsu was an infamously outgoing individual and a tease, in battle however she was as calm and focused as her sister. Fusou and Yamashiro were notoriously vulnerable, but they also were well aware that twelve fourteen-inch rifles were a force to reckon with even against the best Abyssal battleships.

Kii wielded a firepower that surpassed all of them, but her personality didn't match that in the slightest. While most other battleships had even a semblance of self-confidence, Kii seemed to lack even the slightest bit of it. She was shy and somehow seemed awfully misplaced in the front lines. Kongou couldn't help but place the tall battleship aside her own youngest sister. Haruna had been like her once and still was in many ways. But she was gradually finding confidence, in spite of her immaturity compared to her other sisters.

One day, Kongou hoped to see Kii undergo a similar transformation. She was such a powerful ship, and she deserved to wear her name with pride. Maybe, Kongou thought, she could help her realize her potential. A bit of training here, a few heartfelt words of encouragement there, and she would turn the shy battleship into a proper lady of the fleet, one to look up to and one to fill Kongou's heart with pride!

* * *

Owari's ankles ached. The chains they had used to tie her to the bed were cold and strong. She had tried time and again to break free, but to no avail. Every time she struggled against her restraints they grew even tighter, as if controlled by an evil mind set upon mocking her strength and power. Considering she was a prisoner to a bunch of eldritch abominations beyond the understanding of science, that probably wasn't far from the truth.

She had lost count of the hours she had been captive now. Were it days? She couldn't tell. It felt like enough time had passed for at least one day-night-cycle to pass, but the sky remained a dark, grey-ish agglomeration of thick clouds, swirling and intertwining as if the clouds themselves were evil, locked in an eternal struggle amongst each other.

Was that possible? Was the Abyss powerful enough to turn nature itself evil? Could they subdue the weather to their will, maybe even use it to their advantage? It surely looked the part, Owari mused as another rolling thunder washed over the island like a wave over a ship's deck.

How ironic, Owari thought, that she, the only shipgirl to be summoned that never had a swimming steel hull, would use this metaphor.

Well, if the Abyssals were to be believed, she wasn't the only shipgirl without a hull around. They said that her sister had been summoned, and in order to gain physical form, Kii had cast her sister away. Betrayed her, they said.

Owari was not stupid enough to believe this pitiful lie for a second. Kii was her sister. They had been conceived together, and although their keels had been laid in different places, Kii in Kure and Owari in Yokosuka, the two sisters had always shared a deep connection. They had smiled together as they watched their hulls grow, and they had mourned together as their nascent bodies were broken apart. They had cleaned each other's tears as life slipped from their grasp, and they had fallen into their endless slumber side by side.

Except that for one of them, the sleep hadn't been endless.

The floor of the ruined building Owari was chained to was always wet. It likely had never seen a dry day since its inception. She didn't know if it had ever seen tears. If it hadn't, now it knew them.

For a time that could have been measured in minutes or hours, Owari felt hopeless. Not because she was captive to the embodiment of everything evil the oceans held in their grasp, but because no one knew she was there. She was alone on this rock, with no way to contact her kin. If she would ever escape from this place, it would be by her own making entirely.

The waves below roared with the immeasurable power that was reserved only to the oceans. The incesant thunder of the tormented, stormy sea had been a constant companion for her since she arrived here. She had never seen the sea calm. The storm really seemed to last forever. For a moment, Owari wondered if she would ever see the sun in her life.

After an indiscriminative amount of time, Owari fell asleep on her bed. She had curled up into a fetal position as best as she could with fixated ankles, and she had wrapped the bed sheets tightly around her body, even though the blankets were soaked and the wind sent shivers down her spine.

Whereas the waking world was cold and forbidding, her sleep was sickening and intermittent. She frequently awoke, her skin covered by sticky sweat. Sleep returned as quickly as it had left her. Owari hadn't slept in two days, and her psyche was starting to feel it. Sleep was uncomfortable and left her exhausted and hurting rather than refreshed.

If she dreamed, she retained no recollection of it, only the vague feeling of sickness, dread and despair. Gradually, Owari's waking memory turned more hazy, while her dreams became more vivid, until she found herself unable to differentiate between dream and reality. Owari fell in a delirium-esque sleep of which she retained little recollection. Everything felt fuzzy, but not in a safe way, it felt like she was suspended in a drydock that didn't carry her weight.

However, Owari's sleep didn't stay that way, and with time she could feel something lurking in the emptiness of her sleep. She wasn't alone anymore. Someone was there with her in her dream. Someone familiar.

* * *

"Okay, okay, hang on a second." Jane places her pen on her notebook and directs a questioning glance at Kii. "You mean to tell me," she says before spending the duration of a dramatic pause to place her notebook on the table and pick up the tea cup in its stead, "that your sister could communicate with you in her sleep?"

"Ey, she's not in here because of the fancy cuisine." The medical assistant, Saito was his name, interjects with lapidary style. He is visibly tired of the lengthy conversation and likely far over the end of his shift. He probably just wants to go home, Jane thinks to herself and a slight feeling of pity overcomes her. Saito is no thug, he harbors no malice. He probably just feels disappointed that all his hard studying and work have led him to this job, and now that it's dark outside he wants to go home, have some microwave food and fall asleep in a nice comfy bed, maybe at the side of his beloved wife.

Still, the remark is rude and Kii's eyes flash brightly in return. "Ah, will you be silent, yes?!" she snorts angrily and dismissively waves her hand at him. "I'm perfectly fine, yes. Just like my sister was on that island, and like I was at the time. Now, young reporter, do you want to hear what I was about to say?"

"You didn't answer my question." Jane responds, and her gaze is filled with disbelief. "Do you want me to believe that you could somehow telepathically communicate with your sister on some godforsaken atoll in the pacific?"

Kii doesn't answer immediately, instead, she brings her bone-fingered hand to the table and grabs the porcelain cup. Carefully, she moves it to her lips and drinks cautiously. Without a word, Jane and Saito sit and wait until the shipgirl is finished. She takes her sweet time however, and Saito and Jane exchange a glance, half "I can't believe this" and half "I told you so".

However, when Kii puts down the cup, she looks them dead in the eye and, without missing a beat, answers: "Yes."

Jane sighs. She had hoped the reports of the old lady's sanity, or lack thereof, were exaggerated. She had hoped that the discourse with invisible people was just an act. But she just couldn't bring herself to believe in telepathy.

"You surely understand that I struggle to believe you." Jane said. Kii nodded slowly and looked down at her lap. "Is there any way to prove what you are saying?" Jane inquires, and Saito sighs in annoyance.

"I don't think there is." Kii responds. "Is there, nee-sama? No, no there isn't, no."

Jane sighs and grabs her notebook. She gets up and walks towards the window. It's small and the grid of the reinforcement interferes with the view, but nonetheless, the sea of light around them is impressive. Even at this late hour, the motorway is filled with cars, zooming by at a steady rate. Many windows close and far are still brightly illuminated, and off in the distance the glass towers of the financial district are illuminated by the surrounding city.

"Please don't leave." Kii suddenly says. Jane turns around in surprise and sees the old battleship's eyes are beginning to fill with tears. "Please don't leave…" she all but whispers again and hides her face behind shaking hands.

Kii doesn't say it out loud, but with a pang of guilt Jane realizes what the old kanmusu is afraid of. If she leaves now and writes the old woman off as mad, Kii will never again be able to tell her story. The "full story", as she had assured her, even the bits she was not supposed to give away. Some day, probably sooner than later, Kii would die, the last shipgirl to sail the seas would die. She would be buried along with her rigging and her fairies and her logbook, and the last person that knew the "full story" and was willing to give it away would cease to exist.

What a huge waste that would be.

"Okay, even if I believed you," Jane said and once again took her seat at the table, "I can't write this in my book and expect to get it printed. My editor will take one look at it and laugh in my face. Heck, I would probably lose my job!"

"Lose your job for telling the truth?" Kii asks.

"Hey, it's not me you need to convince, it's the readers."

"But you just said-"

"I have decided to take myself out of the equation." Jane looks Kii in the eye. "Treat me like I believe everything. Tell me your story like you want to tell it."

Kii looks surprised. "And the readers and the editor? What will you, reporter lady, do to satisfy them?"

"I'll listen to the entire thing and in the end I'll decide if it's salvageable."

"Salvageable you say?" Kii looks at her lap again. Jane can easily make out the disappointment in her features. But what did she expect?

"How… How did it work? The telepathy I mean. I need to get an idea of what I'm dealing with."

"Well… of course, you can't really hear the other person talking, right? And you can't see them either." Kii again reaches for her cup. "It is hard to put in words what actually happens, yes. You see, it's not an exchange of stimuli, more an exchange of thought, of feelings." The old battleship takes a sip of tea and looks Jane in the eye. "And on that night, I could feel that Owari was hurt."

* * *

Kongou gasped in shock as Kii jolted awake with a scream. Around her, the other kanmusu rose as well, awoken by the scream. Kongou got up, but by the time she was on her feet, Akashi was already by her side.

With two heavily damaged shipgirls, Akashi had deemed it necessary to stay close to them at any time in case anything threatening occurred. Now however, Akashi found herself by the side of a visibly shaken battleship.

"Shh, it's okay. It's okay." Akashi said quietly. Her arms embraced the trembling battleship in a tight hug. Anxiously looking from Akashi to Kongou and back, she began to realize that she was in good company.

"Dess! We're with you, it's fine." Kongou tried and patted the back of the shaken shipgirl. However, she when moved in for a hug, Kii pushed her away.

Looking into Kongou's confused eyes, she spoke, voice still trembling with emotion. "Kongou, I need to see the admiral now."

* * *

At the same time, Owari awoke with a gasp. Around her, the island was cold and inhospitable as ever. However, to Owari, everything had changed.

If it hadn't been for this… not really a dream, but Owari didn't fancy the term vision either – she would never have believed that thrice-damned Abyssal. Her sister was dead, broken up on the scrapyard by the same people that had laid her keel. The humans had condemned them both to endless slumber, to be forgotten by history.

Owari had never forgotten Kii. They had been sisterships after all. For the brief time of their existence, their spirits had spent their lives together, and when they were asleep, they dreamed of sailing the oceans side by side.

Except that Kii had always been more mature. She had always been the voice of reason and logic of the two, whereas Owari was more emotional than her sister. Kii had described her as "impulsive". She had always thought that Kii simply had more self-control, that she could deal better with her emotions.

But now, she knew that her sister had never loved her the way Owari did.

She had left her. She had abandoned her side without a word or hesitation. She had sacrificed her closest friend, her only family, to live a life as a shipgirl. And the worst of it all was, Owari knew she didn't regret a single thing. Kii had never once looked back, had never once spared a thought for her sister.

Owari felt like someone had empaled her. She had trouble breathing, it felt like something heavy was weighing down on her chest, pressing on her body and suffocating her. The realization that her sister had forgotten her was almost physically painful.

The cursed Abyssals had been right. Her sister was iving the good life in a base somewhere on the mainland, with dozens of friends and comrades, while she had been left to sleep for all eternity and to be forgotten and confined to a footnote in history.

She hadn't had a particularly long life by any standards so far, but already, Owari knew that she would never feel more betrayed in her entire life. To think that she would have sacrificed herself for that woman without hesitation while she would dump her as soon as she saw an opportunity to gain a benefit pained Owari beyond expression.

She didn't even shed a tear. Maybe it was because she had bawled her eyes out before, or maybe it was because she was too hurt to cry. Either way, Owari now knew now that no one would ever come to save her. No one would spend the night awake wishing for her to return. No one would sit vigil at her grave, no one would dig a grave in the first place. No one remembered her. No one missed her. She was truly utterly alone.

* * *

Long delay. Writing these chapters is proving to be hard. It's difficult to convey emotions and progress the plot at a steady pace without stretching the screenplay so that it feels like filler. Additionally, I feel I wrote Owari "too well" in the first few chapters, to the point where her belief in her sister's love would never waver. It's a mistake I can't correct in hindsight unless I rewrite the entire thing, and I feel that there isn't enough reason to justify that either, at least as of yet. However, it is also a mistake I can hopefully learn from in my future chapters.

I now have more of a plan for the future than I had when I first started out as well. I have a plan for the entire arc laid out, and I'm excited to reveal it step by step. Again, as I wrote initially, I can not hope to maintain any sort of schedule with my updates, but even if I fall silent for weeks and my SB thread gets locked I'm still here and I'm still writing unless I specifically announce otherwise.

Thank you for reading.


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